Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 6, 2025
Toolooah heard of the death of his mother, in whose charge he had left his little daughter when starting on the expedition, and a group of relatives and friends stooped around the sledge weeping, the women giving vent to their feelings in prolonged wails and moaning.
We left camp at a quarter past one o'clock the following day, our starting having to conform somewhat to the state of the tide, as at high tide we cannot reach the ice. The sledging was simply awful, and poor Toolooah was having a hard time of it and without a murmur or discontented look.
Reindeer were now seen daily in immense herds. The day we moved camp we ran upon a herd of about fifty, and Toolooah killed seven before they could get away, following them up, running and dropping on his knee to fire.
I found a note from Lieutenant Schwatka, in which I read that a bottle of whiskey was among the stores sent; but in the excitement of the occasion and my interest in some papers of 1879, I forgot to look for it. My surprise and disappointment can therefore be imagined that night, when Toolooah dragged the bottle forth from the bottom of the bread box, and asked what it was.
But with true Inuit perverseness he decided at the last minute not to go. He, however, gave Toolooah minute directions for finding the place where to leave Back's River, which is nearly as far west as Lake McDougal, and the route overland, where we would find sledge tracks and footprints to guide us to the camp.
Toolooah was already dressed and outside the igloo as the light started, and said the wolves stopped and looked at it for a second and then fled in dismay, each change of color in the signal light seeming to lend additional wings to their flying feet. We saw them prowling around during the next day's march, but they kept at a respectful distance.
When asked if she remembered by what names the white men were called, she said one of them was called "Agloocar," and another "Toolooah." The latter seemed to be the chief, and it was he who gave the chopping-knife to her husband. "Toolooah" was a little older than the others, and had a large black beard, mixed with gray. He was bigger than any of the others "a big, broad man."
He had never seen or heard of a cairn erected by white men along the coast on this side of Simpson Strait, and had never heard of any other traces of white men here. It was a long time since he had been there, but he could show us the spot. Toolooah, another Netchillik, about forty-five years old, had also been at the boat place, but after nearly everything had been removed.
Since Toolooah had found the inscription scratched on a clay stone on the monument erected by Captain Hall over the remains near Pfeffer River, he had always been watchful, and often, while away from camp hunting, he has come upon a stone near a demolished cairn, or on some conspicuous place which had marks on that he thought might be writing.
The next day the fog and gale recommenced with great fury; but as we were entirely without food, Toolooah went hunting, and came in about half-past nine in the evening with parts of three reindeer that he had succeeded in killing; so we had a good warm meal about midnight, and turned in out of the bitter cold.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking